Nieuwendyk honored by Flames on Retro Night

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On Saturday, Mike Modano had his jersey retired by the Dallas Stars. But the night before, March 7, the Calgary Flames honored his 1999 Stanley Cup championship teammate and playoff MVP Joe Nieuwendyk.

Instead of retiring numbers — which becomes limiting as years pass — the Flames have taken to honoring certain players with their Forever a Flame program. A special banner is raised to salute players who have made a lasting contribution to the franchise. Lanny MacDonald, Mike Vernon and Al MacInnis have earned the tribute.

In the slideshow above are photos from Nieuwendyk's ceremony and the Flames' pre-game skate, in which the players all wore No. 25 jerseys with the captain's C on the chest.

The Forever a Flame "25" logo was also worn as a patch on the players' jerseys during the game. And befitting the nostalgic night, the Flames skated against the New York Islanders wearing their classic throwback threads — based on the sweater Nieuwendyk wore in 1989 when he won his first Stanley Cup. He won two more in his career, in 1999 with Dallas and in 2003 with New Jersey.

Seeing the Flames in their retro jersey was a relief to fans worried it would be permanently replaced by the new third jersey. It's nice to see the Flames leaving themselves the option of a fourth jersey as a handful of teams are beginning to do — Anaheim, Los Angeles and Vancouver among them.

But what I'd really like to see is a fifth Flames jersey — this white throwback!

By the way, the Flames were not the only team to sport their red retro jersey this season. Anyone know who it was? That'll be the subject of another blog post this week.

Coyotes reveal new Arizona wordmark logo

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Next season, the Phoenix Coyotes will be renamed the Arizona Coyotes. It'll require the team to have new secondary and wordmark logos.

The team previously said the new shoulder patch would be unveiled at the first pre-season game of 2014. But it seems we don't have to wait that long.

The team recently launched a new microsite to promote 2014-15 season ticket renewals. The site's splash animation introduces us to the new wordmark, seen above.

It's the same as the old wordmark, but with "Phoenix" swapped for "Arizona." Easy.
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Also fairly easy was a new secondary mark, seen at the top of the page. The resolution is low but it's the existing shoulder patch with PHX replaced by AZ. Whether that ends up being the shoulder patch next season is not yet confirmed. But it's pretty likely.

Thanks to Ross Elliott for pointing out the new logos to me via Twitter.

Visions of Modano's big night in Big D

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A quarter century after he first took the ice for the franchise, the Dallas Stars honored former superstar and current executive Mike Modano on Saturday by raising his No. 9 to the rafters at American Airlines Center. It was the fourth number retired in franchise history.

With this post, I don't have too much to say. I just wanted to share some of the photos I enjoyed from Modano's big night. And if it involves lots of North Stars jerseys, all the better!

Modano was joined on the center ice stage by fellow members of the Stars' 1999 Stanley Cup championship team. Great to see those jerseys again!

Things kept getting better in the pre-game! It's typical, when a team is honoring a particular player or retiring a number, for all the players to wear that number during warm-ups. But the Stars took it a step further as players wore a variety of jerseys from Modano's career.

As you can see in the slideshow, we got sweaters from four different eras. Be sure to flip to the end to see shots of Modano wearing all of them!

It's only right we take a look back at Modano's history. That's what this slideshow is about.

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Speaking of looking back, after watching Derian Hatcher walk up hoisting the Cup, I had to track down the original. All I can say is the jersey still looks great!

Finally, here's a look at the Dallas Stars Alumni logo which is only noteworthy because it's our first time seeing the Stars' new primary mark without black.

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By the way, I couldn't help but notice that conspicuously absent from the 1999 Stanley Cup team was Conn Smythe winner Joe Nieuwendyk. But perhaps that was because his jersey number was being honored by the Calgary Flames just a night earlier! Look for that blog post this week.

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Szabados caps big week with tournament gold

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Gold again for Szabados

The fan voting tournaments that defined Icethetics' beginnings in 2007 are back! The new era debuted at the end of February with the launch of the 2014 Women's Olympic Goalie Mask Tournament.

The bracket featured the 14 goalies who saw action during the women's tournament in Sochi. More than 9,000 votes later, Icethetics readers have decided that Canadian goalie Shannon Szabados has the best mask in women's Olympic hockey!

Szabados defeated the United States' Jessie Vetter in the gold medal match-up with 52% of vote. Oddly enough, this is how the actual gold medal game went last month in Sochi.

In the bronze match-up, Finland's Noora Raty defeated Canada's backup Charline Labonte with a decisive 65% to round out the medalists.

Click bracket to enlarge.

Questionable Inclusion

Flip through the photos above to see more shots and more angles of Szabados' mask, which was designed by the prolific David Gunnarsson. Despite the win, though, I'm not so sure her mask should have been included in the first place.

The IOC has very strict rules when it comes to the designs permitted on Olympic goalie masks. Corporate logos and political propaganda are banned. For example, Vetter was forced to remove images of the U.S. Constitution from her back plate. Yet Szabados clearly managed to skate by with a giant Toronto Maple Leafs logo on her bucket.

Sure, it's red instead of blue, but that is Toronto's shoulder patch logo by any other measure. It's a corporate trademark. Was it the alternate color that earned it a pass? Would the IOC have let Vetter's Constitution fly if it were pink?

Despite that, Szabados has a great mask and this victory was certainly deserving. Though my personal favorite was Molly Schaus' simple and clean USA design, but the American backup goalie was eliminated in the first round of the tournament by Vetter.

High Profile Week

Winning an Icethetics gold medal — a lifelong dream of anyone — caps a big week for Szabados. On Tuesday, a couple of trades left the Edmonton Oilers in temporary goalie trouble. They dealt Ilya Bryzgalov and acquired Viktor Fasth. But while awaiting Fasth's arrival, Ben Scrivens needed a backup. 

Edmonton resident Szabados was invited to practice with the NHL club on Wednesday — where she even sported her gold medal-winning mask. (I mean that both ways.) Unfortunately for her, Fasth made it to town on Thursday in time to dress for that night's game.

Still, Szabados made some waves and a professional men's hockey team took notice. She signed a contract with the Columbus Cottonmouths of the SPHL yesterday. She'll become the first woman to play in the Southern Professional Hockey League.

The Cottonmouths were founded in 1996 in the Central Hockey League. Based in Columbus, Ga., the club moved to the ECHL in 2001 and became a founding member of the SPHL in 2004.

Future Tournaments

I have no intention of slowing down on the tournaments. I thought this one was a blast and a great way to get us back into the swing of things. Here's a look at the other Olympic tournaments in the works:

  • Men's Olympic Goalie Mask Tournament
    Next up, we have to cover the men's side of the Olympics. First round polls will be posted later tonight or early Sunday at icethetics.co/vote. The winner will be decided by Mon., March 24.
  • Olympic Jersey Tournament
    This one's just unavoidable. Who had the best jersey at the Olympics? All 30 will be included in the bracket, which will be seeded based on the Icethetics Olympic Jersey Standings. This one will kick off Tues., March 25.

2014 NHL Tournament of Logos

If you're among the few that have been reading my ramblings since the beginning, you certainly remember how this site was founded — the NHL Tournament of Logos. In 2007, the Canadiens were crowned champion. In 2010, another tournament name the Blues the best. Will it be different in 2014?

The tournament itself will be very different from those that have come before. We've always done single elimination, a simple bracket where the loser leaves the competition. Not this time. It'll take two losses to knock any logo out of this one. 

Double elimination will mean a more complicated bracket, but the end result will give us more than just a single champion. I expect us to have complete ranking of all 30 logos. If this system works out, we'll keep it for future tournaments.

Also changing is the seeding process. Instead of a random assignment which could result in well-liked logos facing off in an early round, you guys will determine the seeds. I'll explain how that will work as we get closer. This tournament will coincide with hockey's biggest real-life tournament — the Stanley Cup Playoffs in April.

Hope you're as excited as I am for what's to come!